OTTAWA — Most Canadians think Justin Trudeau is the odds-on favourite to win the Liberal leadership race in April and also think he offers the best chance among the contenders to beat Stephen Harper’s governing Conservatives in the next election, a new poll has found.

The nationwide survey by Ipsos Reid conducted exclusively for Postmedia News and Global TV also revealed that a majority of Canadians still believe the Liberals, out of power since 2006, will one day return to govern the country.

The poll found that 69 per cent of Canadians feel Trudeau will win the Liberal leadership contest, as compared to 19 per cent who felt astronaut-turned-MP Marc Garneau would eventually prevail.

Moreover, while Trudeau has found himself at the centre of controversy after criticizing the long-gun registry last month and for comments he made about Alberta in 2010, 62 per cent of respondents said he has the best chance of leading the Liberals to victory in the next election.

Again, Garneau came second with 24 per cent, followed by Hall Findlay at six per cent, with Murray and Coyne cited by four per cent each.

Interestingly, Canadians aged 55 years or older were more likely than younger Canadians to say the 63-year-old Garneau would win the leadership race and that he would give the Liberals the best chance of beating the Harper Conservatives.

Similarly, men were more likely than women to give the former astronaut the nod — though 41-year-old Trudeau was still the clear frontrunner among men and older Canadians in both categories.

Liberals have maintained that the leadership campaign will not be a coronation, but Ipsos Reid president Darrell Bricker said all signs indicate the crown is essentially Trudeau’s for the taking.

“These are the kinds of numbers that guys who are kind of political rockstars get,” Bricker said. “There’s clearly something out that smacks of destiny around this, an expectation in the Canadian public. It makes it almost an unfair fight with his competitors.”

The race won’t actually heat up until Jan. 20, when all the registered candidates — those who have filed their papers and paid their $75,000 entry fee — take to the stage in Vancouver for their first debate.

Bricker said it’s difficult at this stage to see what any of the other candidates can put on the table that will be so compelling as to fundamentally shake things up.

“The only thing that could happen is Trudeau blowing himself up,” he said. “Something is going to have to happen to make him not the obvious choice.”

The next leader will be announced in Ottawa on April 14. There are currently seven registered candidates, with the aforementioned five plus former military officer Karen McCrimmon and Toronto lawyer George Takach.

Meanwhile, there have been many predictions about the demise of the Liberal party. The party, under then-prime minister Paul Martin, lost power in 2006 to Harper’s Tories. In every election since, the Liberals have steadily lost seats — in 2008 under Stephane Dion, and in 2011, under Michael Ignatieff.

But more than half of Canadians (56 per cent) feel the Liberals “will some day return to power as Canada’s government,” according to the survey.

Perhaps unsurprisingly, the responses were split along geographic lines, with 72 per cent of Atlantic Canadians envisioning the Liberals as one day being back in charge, followed by Quebecers (63 per cent) and Ontarians (58 per cent).

The Western provinces were not as optimistic about the party’s chances, with only 42 per cent of Albertans believing the Grits would come back to power in Ottawa.

Bricker said the fact more than half of Canadians can still envision the Liberals being back in power is not surprising given its long and generally successful history as a political franchise in the country.

But he said the real question is whether the party can garner enough support to simultaneously pull itself up and push the NDP down in the next federal election.

If not, the result will simply be another round of vote-splitting on the left and a return to government for the Conservatives.

According to the poll, more than half of Canadians (51 per cent) believe that “in the end, the three parties in opposition — the NDP, Liberals and Greens — will not be able to beat the Harper Conservatives on their own, so they should work out an arrangement so they don’t compete against each other and split the anti-conservative vote.”

Support for this statement was strongest in Quebec (69 per cent) and Atlantic Canada (60 per cent), but quickly fell below 50 per cent the farther west one went. Only 47 per cent of Ontarians supported the statement, with 46 per cent of people in Saskatchewan and Manitoba, 39 per cent of Albertans and 38 per cent of British Columbians being on side.

Still, Bricker said that there are signs a coalition or other agreement between the “progressive” parties “doesn’t look as scary.”

The poll of 1,021 Canadians from Ipsos Reid’s online panel was conducted between Dec. 7 and 12 and is considered accurate to within 3.5 percentage points, 95 per cent of the time.